Live: EU prepares for showdown with Russia over oil and gas

12:18am: EU prepares for showdown with Russia over oil and gas

The European Union warned member states Monday to prepare for a possible complete breakdown in gas supplies from Russia, insisting it would not cede to Moscow’s demand that imports be paid for in rubles.

The European Commission will on Tuesday propose to member states a new package of sanctions to punish President Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin for its invasion of Ukraine, including an embargo on Russian oil, officials said.

But energy and environment ministers meeting in Brussels on Monday addressed the larger and potentially more complicated issue of Russia’s natural gas, upon which several countries – including EU top economy Germany – depend for much of their power generation.

Moscow has demanded clients from “unfriendly countries” – including EU member states – pay for gas in rubles, a way to sidestep Western financial sanctions against its central bank. It has cut off Bulgaria and Poland after their firms refused to comply.

After the talks, the French chair of the meeting, ecological transition minister Barbara Pompili, and the European commissioner for energy, Kadri Simson, said the 27 member states were united with Poland and Bulgaria and would stockpile gas to be prepare for a breakdown.

Simson said that “following the full procedure as set out by Russia constitutes a breach of sanctions” imposed by the European Union.

She said that, to her knowledge, no European company was preparing to follow Putin’s decree and change its payment methods.

01:55

5:51am: New EU sanctions would exclude more Russian banks from SWIFT network, Borrell says

A fresh European Union sanctions package over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is set to include “more Russian banks” being pushed out of the global SWIFT network, the bloc’s top diplomat Josep Borrell said Monday.

“In the banking sector, there will be more Russian banks that will leave SWIFT,” the global banking communications system, Borrell said during a visit to Panama.

4:26am: Borrell says EU aims to pass new Russia sanctions as early as next week

The European Union hopes to pass the sixth round of sanctions against Russia at the next meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs Council, the bloc’s chief diplomat said on Monday.

Josep Borrell told a news conference in Panama City, where he is on an official visit, the bloc hopes to curb Russia’s energy exports as part of its efforts to sanction Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.

The European Commission, the executive branch of the union, is expected to propose the package of EU sanctions this week, including a potential embargo on buying Russian oil – a measure that would deprive Moscow of a large revenue stream, but that has so far divided EU countries.

Borrell, who chairs the Foreign Affairs Council meetings, said he hopes the EU will be able to take “measures to significantly limit these imports” but conceded so far there is no agreement from all the members.

“But I am confident that, at least with regard to oil imports, this agreement will be possible between now and the next Council meeting,” he added.

The Council has meetings scheduled for May 10 and May 16 later this month.

2:47am: Ukrainian forces apparently ‘taking ground back’ in Kharkiv

Frank Ledwidge, a senior lecturer in military strategy and law at the University of Portsmouth, United Kingdom, tells FRANCE 24 that the Russian advance has stalled in the Kharkiv area and may force the invading troops to call in reinforcements from the Donbas region.

“It seems the Ukrainians (in Kharkiv) are taking ground back from the Russians and threatening their supply lines,” says Ledwidge. “It looks as if they’re going to need to draw forces away from the Donbas to achieve some kind of rescue of their beleaguered force up there.”

Ledwidge adds that the Russian offensive in Donbas is beginning to slow down, having failed to achieve the kind of breakthrough Moscow was seeking.

01:57

1:08am: Russia plans to ‘annex’ Ukraine’s Donetsk, Lugansk regions with sham referendums, US official says

Russia is planning imminently to “annex” the two eastern regions of Ukraine battered by its invasion after failing to overthrow the Kyiv government, a senior US official said Monday.

“According to the most recent reports, we believe that Russia will try to annex the ‘Donetsk People’s Republic’ and ‘Lugansk People’s Republic’ to Russia,” said Michael Carpenter, the US ambassador to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

“The reports state that Russia plans to engineer referenda upon joining sometime in mid-May,” he told reporters in Washington.

Carpenter said that the United States also believed Russia was considering a similar plan in a third region, Kherson, where Moscow has recently solidified its control and imposed use of its ruble currency.

“We think the reports are highly credible. Unfortunately we have been more right than wrong in exposing what we believe may be coming next, and so that is part of what we’re trying to do here.”

02:02

12:09am: UK’s Johnson to address Ukrainian parliament, announce new aid package

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is scheduled to address Ukraine’s parliament, delivering a message that the fight against Russian invasion is Ukraine’s “finest hour.”

Johnson’s office says the UK leader will announce a new 300 million pound ($375 million) package of military aid to Ukraine when he speaks to the legislature by video link on Tuesday. Britain has already sent Ukraine equipment including missiles and missile launchers. The new package includes electronic warfare equipment, a counter battery radar system, GPS jamming equipment and thousands of night vision devices.

In advance extracts of the address released by the prime minister’s office, Johnson evokes a 1940 speech by World War II leader Winston Churchill as the UK fought attack from Nazi Germany. Johnson will say that “the British people showed such unity and resolve that we remember our time of greatest peril as our finest hour. This is Ukraine’s finest hour, an epic chapter in your national story that will be remembered and recounted for generations to come.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed Britain’s Parliament on March 8, and also likened his country’s struggle to Britain’s fight against the Nazis. Johnson visited Kyiv on April 9.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and REUTERS)